Hey
Yes, A-plots are sometimes vital to your story (depending on what sort of story you're writing). Yes, they can be difficult to manage. When I started writing, they had me scared stiff
I usually start with the result I want and work backwards. Okay, I want Lois thrown out of a plane -- how can I do that?
I think your points (1) and (2) are very closely connected. You *have* to understand your bad guy. Give them a motivation, and give them a goal. Those two things help tremendously when you're wondering what they'd do next.
Motivations don't have to be very complex. Trask's motivation is he hates/fears aliens, and wants to know how to control/destroy Superman.
Goals need to be more specific. Trask wants to discover if Lois Lane can contact Superman, and he doesn't care if she dies in the process.
Then once you have the goal, you have to figure out the method. *How* does Trask figure out what he wants to know? Maybe he'll put the theory to a test. What kind of test? Something where Lois has time and motivation to scream for help -- throwing her out of a plane might work.
You really have to get inside your bad guy's head to some degree -- their actions ought to seem logical and reasonable to them. The reader has to be able to see *why* a character would do something (which doesn't have to be explained up front, but it's got to come into the story somewhere).
The A-plot/B-plot balance varies by story. I personally like a lot of B-plot, and tend to view my A-plots as a means to an end. You don't have to spend a lot of time on them, but if you've got an A-plot at all it ought to make sense.
There are a lot of good books out there about writing; I sort of collect them. One I'd recommend for you is
The Plot Thickens by Noah Lukeman. Have you got a public library? They probably have a section on fiction writing.
Hope this helps.
PJ
